Terminator rules

THE Government has rejected pleas to remove voluntary termination (VT) clauses from hire purchase and conditional sale agreements.

Motor finance houses had lobbied strongly for the practice – where consumers can abandon HP agreements after paying only half of the borrowed finance – to be scrapped.

It is estimated VTs cost finance companies an average of £1,500 for each returned car. Consumer Affairs Minister Gerry Sutcliffe said that as a consumer protection, VTs were an ‘essential provision of hire purchase’.